14,115 Steps and Missed Opportunity

Me at Disneyland, August 1980, with my girls (Twin 1 and Twin 2).

Twin 1 on the left, Twin 2 on the right would have been 12 years old at the time.

Me at Disneyland, October 17, 2024 with Twin 1's baby girl (my granddaughter), granddaughter's husband (GrandSIL), granddaughter's babies (the great grands to me), and a Great Granddaughter I never knew I had until recently (long story ……… progeny of a family member on a long prodigal journey through life, and the reason I put myself on Ancestry, so children of that prodigal granddaughter can find their people when they grow up and go looking).

With all the walking and picture taking (over 100 pics), I didn’t think to recreate the 1980 photo — arm around granddaughter as I did with her mom, until I was on the road headed home.

Missed Opportunity there.

Walking down Main Street, we caught the band marching in to perform.

I could have listened to the band forever, but GrandSIL wanted to head for Fantasyland, so the babies could see Small World.

Small World was my favorite as well back in the day, and I just so happened to have a photo of me, circa 1980, looking mesmerized by the singing dolls.

Small World is still a favorite, so I was looking forward to revisiting.

We made it to Fantasyland, but unfortunately found Small World to be closed/under repairs, so we let the great grandson burn off some energy in the Play Yard, where I heard the tent set up for the kids calling to me.

I convinced my new relative to camp out with me and though it wasn't easy to get down on the ground, crawl my big arse in, turn around to pose, I managed to do so, then crawled out and got out on my own. Call it the magic of CrossFit, three times a week for four years.

"That's not Goofy", I was informed by granddaughter when I said, "Oh look, there's Goofy".

"No grandma, that's his son Max".

"I didn't know Goofy had a son. Didn't know he was married", said I.

"He's a single dad", said she.

Who knew?

I loved Star Wars Land, where first great grandbaby girl somehow got in trouble with a Stormtrooper, and then I and my new relative saved the world by joining in the battle against the First Order in Rise of the Resistance ……… took positions as Engineers on the Millennium Falcon.

As the pilots careened through space, and the gunners fired, my job (and new relative's job) as Engineers was to ……… when the ship was hit and something was broken, fix what was broken.

We saved the world, and landed safely.

You're welcome.

But then there was a flurry of activity, Chewbacca the Wookie showed up, began running around and we heard it was because ……… now I don't know if it was the Pilots who messed up or the Engineers, but whoever it was, in one of the ships that followed, caused their ship to crash.

Oh well, we did our job.

After Chewbacca sorted out the responsible parties, he gathered men from the crowd to participate in a "Who can make the best Wookie sound".

GrandSIL was selected ……… probably because of his beard, and got robbed.

He clearly made the better sound, but the other guy had more family members rooting for him.

I call foul, but GrandSIL did later get a photo with Chewbacca, so that was a win.

The girls (granddaughter and new relative) were anxious to find a character they kept referring to as Tiana.

Do you know who that is? I didn't, but was informed Tiana is from the animated film The Princess and the Frog AND is Disney's First Black Princess.

Again ……… who knew?

Fortunately, we walked right up on her and she was uber gracious. Took time to address individually the baby, granddaughter and my new relative.

The girls were thrilled, and meeting the First Black Princess was so emotional for granddaughter that she cried after.

I gave her a hug and said, "If you get this emotional over Disney's First Black Princess, how are you going to handle the First Female President being Black?"

What we did after that was a blur of lunch, more walking, not being able to get into Dumbo because the lines were long, same when I wanted to ride one of the merry-go-round horses, so on and so forth ……… the waits were 45 minutes to an hour on everything. The only reason we made it onto the Millennium Falcon, was because we signed up as single riders and were matched with groups who'd been waiting in long lines and needed us to fill the crew.

So anyway, no amount of CrossFit could stop the bottom of my feet from aching from so much walking. So, a little after 4:00, I tapped out, headed for the hotel, checked in, relaxed, while the others did the park until dark.

Upon checking out this morning, we made sure to take photos at the Great Mickey Mouse Pumpkin.

And there you have my fun but exhausting adventure with the kids.

My step count was off the chart, but I survived to tell the tale.